Healing Melodies

Just recently, while I was laboring in the emergency department, I discovered an old, familiar church song reverberating through my consciousness. Delighted to recall this moving tune, I softly sang “It is Well with My Soul” throughout the shift, somewhat ameliorating the maddening chaos.

This remembrance shouldn’t have come as a surprise, as I was raised in the Methodist Church, and every so often on Wednesday services, the congregation would happily put aside the modern hymnbook and break out the weathered, brown Cokesbury Worship Hymnal.  Ah, what glorious music was printed on those venerable pages!  Not only was “It is Well with My Soul” among the songs listed, but also “The Old Rugged Cross,” “Nearer, My God to Thee,” “In the Garden,” among many other memorable Christian classics.  After years of singing them repeatedly, the words and melodies became indelibly etched in my mind, and, without fail, their rendition bestowed on me a warm, tranquil feeling, connecting me with a heartfelt, sacred time and space.

With this in mind, in the months prior to my mother’s death, knowing how much she loved these precious songs, often I would sing a handful of them to her as she lay in her hospital bed.  When she was conscious, I would sing ones that she requested, invariably bringing a smile to her face. But, as death insidiously approached, she gradually became comatose, yet still I would repeatedly sing her favorites at the bedside, tears flowing from my eyes, feeling that somehow, someway, she could hear them. In this way, my mother and I were still able to communicate up to the moment of her death, giving me no small measure of comfort through those challenging times.

So, the next time I feel pressured or out of sorts, for whatever reason, I will try to recall songs of meaning from my past.  In spite of the pain of the moment, the discomfort can be soothed and made bearable by healing melodies.  Horatio Spafford was right.

No matter the circumstances, it is well with my soul.